A Storm Too Soon: A Remarkable True Survival Story in 80-Foot Seas
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A Storm Too Soon: A Remarkable True Survival Story in 80-Foot Seas
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Overview
A spellbinding tale of maritime disaster, survival, and an absolutely daring rescue from Michael J. Tougias, the author of The Finest Hours, which is now a major motion picture.
When a forty-seven-foot sailboat disappears in the Gulf Stream during a disastrous storm, it leaves behind three weary sailors struggling to stay alive on a life raft in the throes of violent waves eighty feet tall. This middle-grade adaptation of an adult nonfiction book tells the story of the four intrepid Coast Guardsmen who braved the sea and this ruthless storm, hoping to rescue the stranded sailors.
New York Times bestselling author Michael J. Tougias adapts his histories of real life stories for young readers in his True Rescue Series, capturing the heroism and humanity of people on life-saving missions during maritime disasters.
More Thrilling True Rescue Books:
The Finest Hours (Young Readers Edition)
Into the Blizzard (Young Readers Edition)
Attacked at Sea (Young Readers Edition)
In Harm's Way (Young Readers Edition)
Rescue on the Bounty (Young Readers Edition)
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781627792820 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Henry Holt and Co. (BYR) |
| Publication date: | 05/24/2016 |
| Series: | True Storm Rescues Series |
| Sold by: | Macmillan |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 176 |
| Sales rank: | 612,692 |
| Lexile: | 1090L (what's this?) |
| File size: | 1 MB |
| Age Range: | 9 - 13 Years |
About the Author
MICHAEL J. TOUGIAS is a New York Times bestselling author and coauthor of over thirty books for adults and middle readers. His books include Fatal Forecast, The Finest Hours, Overboard!, A Storm Too Soon, So Close to Home, The Waters Between Us, Extreme Survival, and The Power of Positive Fishing. He offers slide presentations and an inspiration program titled “Survival Lessons: Decision Making Under Pressure.” Visit www.michaeltougias.com
Read an Excerpt
A Storm Too Soon
A Remarkable True Survival Story in 80-Foot Seas
By Michael J. Tougias
Henry Holt and Company
Copyright © 2016 Michael J. TougiasAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-62779-282-0
CHAPTER 1
FLORIDA — COUNTDOWN TO THE CROSSING
The flight from Ottawa to Florida is a long one, but Rudy Snel doesn't mind as he gazes out the aircraft window at the clouds below. He's thinking about the next leg of his trip: a voyage on the Sean Seamour II, a forty-four-foot sailboat that will carry him and two others from Florida to France. Sailing across the Atlantic has been a dream of Rudy's since he was nine, when his family emigrated from the Netherlands to Canada, crossing the Atlantic on a passenger ship. In the course of the voyage, they encountered a storm that caused the ocean liner to pitch and roll, making just about everyone on board seasick. But not Rudy. He was out on the top deck in the pelting rain having the time of his life, awed by the raging sea around him.
Rudy is now sixty-two years old and recently retired from a teaching career in the public schools. He finally has the time to live out his dream of returning to the sea. A Canadian with gray hair and a neatly trimmed beard, he is an adventurous soul; the hardships expected on a transatlantic crossing don't bother him in the least. He owns his own sailboat and often sails the Ottawa River, but he has also mastered piloting small aircraft and parachuting. He has made more than six hundred parachute jumps. On one of those jumps, his parachute did not deploy properly. He looked up at the tangled mess during his free fall but never panicked. Instead, he calmly deployed his reserve parachute and landed safely. His reaction wasn't one of alarm but one of annoyance.
When he saw a notice on a website announcing that a crew was needed for a transatlantic crossing, he immediately contacted the captain. Rudy explained that he wanted to go on the voyage to learn about offshore sailing and most especially because it would be an entirely new experience.
* * *
When the plane touches down in Jacksonville, Florida, Rudy disembarks and follows the crowd down to baggage claim. He is met by the captain, fifty-seven-year-old Jean Pierre de Lutz, who goes by the nickname JP. The two men shake hands and then head outside. The warm, humid air embraces Rudy, a welcome change from the cold of Ottawa. It is late April, the temperature is in the mid-eighties, and the sunshine causes Rudy to squint.
They drive directly to the Sean Seamour II, which is moored at Green Cove Springs on the St. Johns River. Rudy likes what he sees. The sailboat has a center cockpit protected by a hard dodger (rigid windshield), a single mast directly in front of the cockpit, and twin guardrails surrounding the white vessel. During inclement weather, the cockpit can be completely enclosed with canvas curtains and windows. It's a sleek-looking boat — Rudy thinks it's beautiful.
The third crew member, Ben Tye, emerges from the boat's cabin. JP introduces the thirty-one-year-old sailor to Rudy. Ben is British, with a short, stocky build and a shaved head. He began his career in the tourism industry, but he soon turned his interest to the sea, teaching inshore sailing on small vessels. He has sailed from Europe to the United States, and on this trip he will reverse course. Reserved by nature, Ben tends to take time before opening up. But that night at dinner, he already feels comfortable and is more than satisfied that the threesome will make a good crew. He's impressed that JP has spared no expense in equipping the boat and is taking his time readying it for the crossing. In his quiet manner, JP patiently explains the intricacies of his vessel, and Ben senses that this is a man who never gets rattled.
Ben and Rudy don't know it, but JP had more than a dozen candidates answer his request for a crew. He interviewed each applicant, narrowing them down to two crew members, relying on his instincts to determine who would be the best fit. He was more than sure that Rudy and Ben were the right men for the job. JP selected May as the optimal time of year for an eastbound crossing of the Atlantic, primarily because it would put them ahead of hurricane season. He'd had a brush with a hurricane in a prior crossing and wanted no part of another.
The voyage is not scheduled for another few days because the Sean Seamour II was in storage for two and a half years and needs a complete overhaul, cleaning, and provisioning. Some of the equipment was removed and stored in an air-conditioned warehouse. Now that equipment needs to be inspected, replaced if necessary, and secured in its proper position aboard the boat. Rudy and Ben will work under JP's supervision.
The preparation introduces Ben and Rudy to the inner workings of the boat as they replace lines, clean equipment, and practice using the pumps. The two men lay out the drogues (pieces of fabric that can be trailed behind the boat to add stability during storms) on the dock.
A vital piece of equipment on any boat is a radio beacon, which can signal to land that the boat and crew are in distress. These beacons are crucial in the telling of this rescue, and the two kinds referred to throughout the book are:
• GPIRB — global position indicating radio beacon, which can send a signal to the Coast Guard quickly pinpointing the location of an emergency
• EPIRB — emergency position indicating radio beacon, an older piece of equipment that sends a signal but does not use GPS technology
The life raft and the GPIRB went out for recertification, and the entire crew now reviews their operation before securing the two pieces of safety equipment. In addition to the GPIRB mounted in its cradle inside the cabin of the Sean Seamour II, there is also an older EPIRB from an earlier boat of JP's on board. Although it is a somewhat redundant piece of equipment, JP has tested its eleven-year-old batteries and the unit works, so he decides to keep it on board. He installs the EPIRB in its cradle on the inside of the cockpit's dodger, where it's safe from sea spray. The EPIRB is water-activated, and the captain doesn't want any false alarms.
JP reviews the heavy-weather contingencies with the crew, making sure they understand exactly what needs to be fastened down in a storm. They examine the location and operation of all safety equipment. One person will be on watch at all times, and they will all wear safety harnesses with tethers clipped to the boat at night and in heavy weather. The tethers are six-foot-long lines: if a man falls overboard, he will not get swept away from the vessel and can try to climb back on board.
The time spent working on the boat has been valuable for the three sailors to get to know one another before heading out to the open water. Rudy is glad for the few days of preparation; if he found anything of concern about his crewmates, he figured he could always back out of the voyage. He knows a transatlantic crossing has its risks, and he wants to feel extra comfortable with his partners. They will be in close quarters for several weeks. Rudy has a good feeling about both men. Ben is a knowledgeable sailor and a fun companion, and JP is soft-spoken, easygoing, and competent.
Departure is scheduled for May 1, 2007, but the men have to wait an extra day for some new batteries. This one-day delay will have significant consequences.
CHAPTER 2JEAN PIERRE
Before beginning the voyage at six thirty in the morning on May 2, JP checks the marine weather forecast and finds nothing out of the ordinary. As the three men untie the lines, some friends from the marina come down to wave good-bye. JP then makes good on a promise. He will stop smoking now that the voyage has begun. To prove it, the short and slender captain with wispy gray hair takes his last pack of cigarettes, ceremoniously holds it high in the air, and tosses it into the water — his new life as a nonsmoker begins at this moment. Rudy and Ben exchange glances. They hope their relaxed captain doesn't turn into Ahab, the angry captain featured in the classic novel Moby-Dick.
Using the motor, JP guides the Sean Seamour II down the St. Johns River, going right through the heart of Jacksonville, Florida, as the sun clears the eastern horizon. As the boat approaches the first bridge, Rudy can't help but wonder if the mast — all sixty-one feet of it — will clear the underside, but JP assures him it will, and it does. Near the river's mouth, they stop at a marina to top off the diesel tanks and fill up spare containers with more fuel. During the refueling, Rudy walks to a market and purchases three orders of fish and chips.
JP uses this opportunity to call his wife, Mayke (pronounced My-keh), a successful artist. They talk for a few moments, but JP wonders why Mayke is so mad at him for not calling earlier. She doesn't tell him the real reason: She has had an uneasy feeling that the voyage will not go well.
Mayke knows her husband is a safety-conscious sailor and that the Sean Seamour II is more than capable of handling rough weather. But ever since she dropped JP at the airport a couple of weeks earlier, her apprehension has grown in intensity with each passing day. Sleep has been difficult, and her time painting in the studio has suffered. She just wants her conversation with JP to end before she blurts out her misgivings and puts a damper on his enthusiasm for the voyage.
* * *
When Rudy returns with the fish and chips, the men enjoy their lunch — their last meal from the outside world. Then they resume motoring, reaching the ocean at two p.m.
I'm finally doing it, thinks Rudy as he watches the shore disappear. We're on our way.
There's a slight breeze from the southwest, and the men are able to get their sails up. They're at the edge of the Gulf Stream, a current in the ocean that runs from the tip of Florida northeast along the coast of the United States. The Gulf Stream's current will help propel the Sean Seamour II northeastward on the early days of the journey. Their plan is to sail northeast toward Bermuda and then turn due east toward Europe.
After watching the sunset, JP and Ben go to bed while Rudy stands watch to make sure they don't get too close to any other vessels. He is assisted by a radar unit that will sound an alarm if another vessel is in the vicinity. Rudy wears his safety harness with the tether clipped to a firm object on the boat. This precaution is especially wise at night because a sailor who goes overboard in the dark has a slim chance of being found. There are few fates worse than swimming frantically and hollering in the darkness, trying to keep up with a boat whose stern lights are growing fainter and fainter.
Rudy's glad he has the first watch; he's much too excited to sleep, and he's already thinking ahead to tomorrow, his first full day at sea. Just before midnight, with a half-moon illuminating the water, Rudy has his first thrill of the trip. He's startled by a splash a couple of feet away from the boat. Peering at the ocean, he sees the outline of a dolphin come through the water. There are perhaps twenty dolphins swimming along either side of the Sean Seamour II, occasionally breaking the surface with acrobatic leaps. Rudy watches, mesmerized. He has never seen dolphins at sea, and this pod seems to want to race the boat, just a few feet away from the awestruck Canadian. Grinning, Rudy feels a sense of well-being from contact with the natural world of the sea.
Looking from the radar screen back to the dolphins, Rudy expects the pod to veer away from the boat at any moment. Instead, the dolphins accompany the sailor for the next hour. Finally, at about one a.m., the dolphins leave, and Rudy checks a computer navigation screen that shows both the actual course of the sailboat and the course plotted in advance by JP. The vessel seems a bit off track. Rudy decides to wake JP and get his advice.
JP joins Rudy in the cockpit, and together they get the boat back on course and sail into the night. JP loves sailing so much, he doesn't want to miss any of it by sleeping. Like many die-hard sailors, he has had an unconventional life. JP was born in New York City to a French father and a Belgian mother. They were not ready to raise a child, and JP's father was abusive to both his son and his wife. Because of the ill treatment, JP's mother fled her husband, abandoning her three-year-old son. Neighbors often heard him crying and called social services when they realized he was left alone for hours at a time in his father's apartment.
Social services removed JP from the apartment and placed him in a foster home, which was little better than his lonely existence in the apartment. He was the youngest of several children there, and the older boys bullied him. But he was a resourceful child, and out of necessity he adapted, learning that he could survive by being alone and hiding when necessary.
When he was six years old, JP's father somehow managed to regain custody of him. JP went to live with his father and his new wife, Betty. The following years were disastrous for young Jean Pierre because his father was both physically and verbally abusive. His stepmother, Betty, was a kind woman, but she, too, had to flee the cruelties of her husband when JP was ten years old, leaving him alone with his father. In an effort to get his second wife back, JP's father concocted a heinous plan. Knowing Betty loved the boy, he surmised that if she realized JP was in trouble, she would return.
In an unspeakable act of cruelty, his father intentionally dropped boiling water on his son. The "accident" accomplished his father's intended effect: Betty returned out of concern for the boy. She, too, was a victim of this manipulative madman.
Shortly after JP's recovery, Betty arranged for him to be reunited with his biological mother, wanting to get him away from her husband. JP was shipped off yet again, this time to France, where his mother lived by the ocean. The young boy, who had endured so much cruelty, found that the sea had a soothing effect. Saint-Tropez, on France's Mediterranean coast, opened JP's eyes to the marvels of the ocean. When he wasn't in school, he spent much of his free time prowling the seawalls while expectantly watching the fishing boats come and go from the port.
Soon the local fishermen noticed the quiet American boy watching them, and one kindly fisherman finally motioned for JP to come aboard his boat. The fisherman explained that if JP arrived at the wharf early the next morning, he could join the man on his fishing trip. That began several years of JP's quest to learn everything he could about the ocean and boats.
* * *
JP's aspiration was further fueled when he read about the exploits of sixteen-year-old Robin Lee Graham, who set out to sail around the world in his twenty-four-foot sloop named Dove. National Geographic published periodic articles of the young sailor's adventures as he sailed through the South Pacific, was demasted twice during storms, and met his future wife on the island of Fiji. It took Graham a little over four years to complete his journey, but nevertheless, when he finished in 1970, he became the youngest person to sail solo around the planet. Graham became JP's inspiration and hero.
JP thought the adventure of circumnavigating the world was the perfect challenge, and he vowed that someday he would set sail and not return until he had crossed the seven seas. Neither JP nor Graham minded being alone, but there was one big difference in their childhood: Graham had a loving father who had taught his son to sail and celebrated his son's independent streak. JP didn't let his past slow him down; he simply taught himself what he needed to know or asked questions of his fisherman friends.
JP's dreams of blue-water sailing were put on hold when he was seventeen and attended landlocked Syracuse University in New York, then later found a job in Germany. The young man had a sharp mind that could intuitively solve problems. He also had a pair of hands that could make or fix just about anything. In 1978, he put those talents to use, starting his own business developing and marketing consumer products, including toys and household goods. Four years later, he sold the business.
JP had married and fathered three children when new business opportunities prompted him and his family to move from Europe to the Washington, D.C., area. His heavy workload and frequent travel kept him not only from the sea but also from his family. Soon his marriage fractured, ending in divorce in 1995.
After the divorce, JP turned his attention back to the sea, often walking the harbors and boatyards, eyeing different models of sailboats. He purchased a thirty-three-foot sailboat that he christened the Lou Pantai, which roughly translates to "The Dream" in an old dialect that was spoken in the Provence region of France. Living aboard the Lou Pantai where it was moored at Annapolis, Maryland, JP planned his blue-water voyage. He read every sailing book he could find to help him prepare the vessel for a transatlantic crossing. JP was a loner by nature, and that cold winter, while living solo aboard his vessel, he felt exhilarated by the possibilities that stretched before him.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from A Storm Too Soon by Michael J. Tougias. Copyright © 2016 Michael J. Tougias. Excerpted by permission of Henry Holt and Company.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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Table of Contents
Contents
Title Page,Copyright Notice,
Dedication,
Introduction: Sailors and Rescuers,
PART I,
1 Florida — Countdown to the Crossing,
2 Jean Pierre,
3 Riding the Gulf Stream,
4 Spirits Are High,
5 The Gathering Storm,
6 Help Is Greatly Needed,
PART II,
7 Multiple Maydays — The SAR Command Center,
8 The Wave,
9 The Life Raft,
10 Desperation,
11 The Cutter Tampa and the C-130,
12 Tumbling in Chaos,
13 Convulsions,
PART III,
14 Need Max Gas,
15 Tether Ourselves Together,
16 "Mark, Mark, Mark!",
17 Like a Hockey Puck on Ice,
18 Deploying the Swimmer,
19 "He Needs to Go First ...",
20 As If Shot from a Cannon,
21 They're Not Coming for Us,
22 He's Going to Drown,
23 Cherry Point Naval Hospital,
24 Heading Home,
Epilogue,
Author's Note and Acknowledgments,
About the Author,
Copyright,